


i'm not going outside

by la_victorienne



Category: Torchwood
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-01-28
Updated: 2009-01-28
Packaged: 2018-10-16 01:01:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10560722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/la_victorienne/pseuds/la_victorienne
Summary: he is driving away. a love story.





	

Days like this he feels like something’s missing, like he left something behind in the years he lost. He knows cerebrally that when you suffer relatively long-term amnesia due to head trauma there isn’t much hope of ever regaining the dissolved years, but days like this he wonders if out there somewhere is a trigger, something that will bring back what he can’t remember, something that will reveal to him that he is much greater than what he appears to be. Days like this he looks back into the side mirror and sees a world filled with promise and possibility, only a few tracks in the white snow, only a few trees in the wide horizon. Days like this he feels like the world will never end, even though on other days he’s sure it will, and soon, due to signs and portents he doesn’t fully understand. Maybe he was a pagan in the invisible years, or some sort of heeby-jeeby freaky-deaky pretend-Druid, searching for the secrets of Stonehenge or something, and that’s why he seems to be able to sense danger when it comes. Or maybe he was a meteorologist, working behind the scenes on some television show that no-one but the sheep watch, and that’s why the grey sky makes him uneasy.

Or maybe he was a superhero, and the world really is ending, and without him it’ll all fall to pieces, and he doesn’t ever know why he’s so content with that answer.

Days like this when he’s on his way home to his Tad’s old house, kept in the estate for him, the executor said, for whenever he wanted it, when the sky is grey and the snow is slick, he fears in the deepest part of himself that the something which is missing is incredibly important, even though it’s a day when the world will never end, because on those days he’s supposed to do something to prevent the other days from happening. It’s all very jumbled and confused in his head, but the doctors say that’s normal, and he’ll recover. He’s not sure they know what they’re talking about because they’ve never felt like this, nor is he sure he even wants to recover, when this sensation of loss is so acute, so real, that he knows without a doubt that even if he can’t remember most of his life, he is, in fact, alive.

His thoughts are drifting and he’s still watching the mirror, not the road, so the man in the grey army coat takes him by surprise, and he brakes, swerves, almost hits the immobile man, then finally skids to a stop without going into a snowdrift or toppling over, and he wonders where he learned to drive like that. The man in the grey coat walks forward, approaches the car door, and the look on his face is so painfully familiar he almost runs out to greet him, throw his arms around this man’s shoulders and never let go – although he knows that he won’t, because it’s a stupid idea. At least, it’s a stupid idea until the man in the grey coat jerks the door open and pulls him bodily out of his fancy hybrid compact SUV, which he bought because he lives in hilly country but had enough money in the bank to be environmentally friendly, who knew. Anyway, this man has him by the shirt and all of a sudden he’s being kissed, by a man, no less, and he didn’t even know he liked men until he smells coffee and gun smoke and just the faintest resonance of pure, unadulterated sex on the man’s skin and – Ianto almost faints, but he grabs Jack’s shoulders and latches on.

“Sorry, sorry, I’m sorry, I wanted to do it another way but we need you, Ianto, things are happening and I can’t stop them and I can’t stop myself and I need you, Ianto, I need you.”

Ianto pushes away from Jack, doubling over, and dry-heaves in the road, spattering the white with hot spittle before the real nausea hits and he does paint the street a queer shade of green. “I need a minute,” he whispers, and even though it’s so quiet even he can’t hear it through the blood in his ears, he knows Jack can. “Just a minute, oh god, Jack.”

And he’s sobbing roughly, and Jack has him in his arms before he can ask for it, and the wool of the coat is sweet and dark, and his tears mingle with all the others that have been cried onto this coat until he can’t keep himself upright any longer and he and Jack both sink to their knees, arms around each other in an embrace he can’t believe he could forget. Jack presses kisses into his hair, into every available piece of his head, saying things so lovely and meaningless Ianto might think they were one of his strange dreams except for the fact that he vividly remembers taking the RetCon and leaving a note on the counter for Jack to find when he woke, and oh, why should Jack be the one comforting? Why should Jack always be the one forgiving?

“Because I always need you to forgive me, too,” he hears, and he didn’t realize he’d said the words aloud, but they can’t be taken back now. Ianto lifts his head and presses his lips to Jack’s mouth and he knows he tastes like vomit but Jack sweeps his tongue in Ianto’s mouth anyway, hitting all of the familiar spots. “You can’t leave me,” Jack whispers against Ianto’s skin, snow soaking into both of their trousers. “I tried so hard to let you go, Ianto, because I thought it was what we both needed. But I can’t. I can’t do any of this without you.”

Ianto just nods into Jack’s shoulder and squeezes Jack’s body tighter, appalled at himself, that he could ever think to let go of this, of here, of now. He cries until the snot dries unappealingly on his face and then gets up, wiping his tears on his sleeve and shivering.

“Come back with me,” he stutters, holding a hand out for Jack to take. “I have to pack, and I can make you a cup of coffee at the house before we decide whether or not to sell it. What do you say?”

Jack takes the hand offered to him and stands up, holding tight to Ianto’s fingers. “Yes,” he says, and Ianto notices that Jack has tear-tracks on his face too. “The answer is always yes.”


End file.
